Falling and Rising
by Questioning.Silence
Summary: My take on the spoilers for episode 3:13. When new evidence pertaining to Beckett's mother's murder comes to light, everything starts to crash down around her.
1. Chapter 1

_A/N: I'm thoroughly upset. I was certain that episode 3:13 was supposed to air TODAY. And now we have to wait at least another week. This is a cruel world. Anyway, I was so disappointed that I felt the need to write my own take on the events. So..._

_SPOILER ALERT! Major spoilers for 3:13! Consider yourselves warned._

_This story shouldn't be terribly long. It'll be somewhere between 2 and 4 or so chapters... I think. I would love reviews if you have the time, seeing as this is my first attempt at a _Castle _fanfiction_.

_Disclaimer: NOT mine. Yeah, I'm crying._

* * *

He just... sits there.

Looks amused, even.

Sits atop the hard metal table of the interrogation room, swinging one leg. He's easily the biggest man she's ever seen in her life.

Glances at his fingernails. Then looks up, straight at the mirrored wall. The corners of his mouth twitch.

He must know she's watching him.

She begins to swear under her breath, starting in Russian, but progressing to English when the foreign words don't feel potent enough. Castle shifts uncomfortably beside her.

"Beckett…" he murmurs softly but doesn't say anything more. He's a writer, and yet there is nothing he can think of to say.

She clamps her lips together but doesn't take her eyes off of their… suspect.

Suspect isn't the word she'd like to use here. He is so obviously guilty that she's proud of the fact that she can stand here without plucking her firearm from her hip.

"Detective?"

Beckett can't ignore her boss like she can Castle. She turns, reluctantly, tearing her eyes away. "Sir?"

"We can get someone else to perform this interrogation, if you'd like," Captain Montgomery says quietly, without reproach. "Maybe that would be better."

She idly wonders if her swearing was loud enough to reach his ears. It would definitely be the better, more professional decision to ask another detective to help her out here. She's always been very polished and professional.

Not this time.

"No, sir. I can do it."

"I know you _can_, Detective. It's not a question of that."

Turning back around, she stares through the glass with an almost hollow expression. A minute passes. She looks back at him over her shoulder. "I _need_ to," she says roughly.

He should remove her from the case. That's his job, as captain of the precinct, and they both know it. She has no business interrogating this man.

But Montgomery nods, sharply and so jerkily that it's more of a bob than a nod. "Detectives Ryan, Esposito, a word?" he asks, opening the door and stepping outside of the observation room. They follow him, Ryan shooting one last glance back at Beckett, who's gripping the ridge at the bottom of the pane of one-sided glass so hard that the tendons in her hands and wrists are raised.

"May I come in with you?" Castle asks quietly once the door has clicked shut.

She blinks, surprised. She'd already expected him to follow her in to the interrogation room, as always. Glancing over at him, she sees his expression in the dim light. He's pale but has the most sincere look on his face that she's ever seen. In a different situation, it might have made her offer a reassuring smile. All that she can manage is a nod as abrupt as Montgomery's.

Beckett turns back to the glass.

He's still just sitting there. Stretches lazily, tilting, raking his eye across the ceiling and extending his arms out as he yawns. Brings his head down and stares straight at the mirror, almost directly into Beckett's eyes.

Grins.

A wide, arrogant, ear-to-ear smirk.

Her stomach swoops like she's on a roller coaster, drops, and she pushes backward off the wall, whipping around. She can hear her heartbeat in her ears and feel it pounding against her rib cage.

Blindly, she stares straight ahead, unseeing. It's almost like a haze is draped across her vision. This man is a murderer. An unrepentant one. Her _mother's_ murderer. The man who had _hired_ a man to _kill_ her mother. His may have been the last face Johanna had ever seen. Why did she think she for one moment that she could handle this interrogation?

"Kate."

The low whisper brings her from her daze. Castle is there. She'd nearly forgotten him entirely. He puts a hand on her shoulder, squeezing, bringing her back into reality. She doesn't even notice that he's just called her by her first name.

"You can do this," he says, staring right into her eyes. "You _can._"

A long moment passes. "…Okay," she whispers, not really believing him. She just needs to get this over with.

They exit the room, squinting as the brighter light hits their eyes. Ryan and Esposito are nodding slowly to something that Montgomery is saying, but Beckett ignores them, ignores the recording technician who steps into the observation room as she exits, stepping quickly over to her desk and grabbing the thick manila folder laying in the center.

She falters only once, right before she opens the door to the interrogation room, then straightens up, swallows, and carelessly pushes the door open. Castle follows.

"Good afternoon, Mr.—" she flips the folder open to the first page and pretends to consult it, "Atkins," she finishes smoothly, casually, as if this interrogation means so little that she has already forgotten his name.

He glances lazily at her from his perch on the table. "Well what do ya know. A female cop," he smirks again, that callous and confident grin, and Beckett feels her blood run first cold and then red-hot.

Atkins slowly gets to his feet and straightens himself out. He towers above her by at least a foot, even in her heels, and is twice as wide.

"Detective Kate Rodriguez," she flashes a brief, fake smile, "And this is my partner, Rick Martin."

Castle blinks, then takes his turn with a smile as Atkins glances his way. He hopes he's the only one who noticed the tiny pause between their first and last names. Idly, he wonders where she came up with those two names. He didn't know any Rodriguezes...

"Won't you have a seat?" Beckett gestures towards the chair facing the mirror.

"Don't mind if I do," Atkins won't stop smirking as he deliberately sits in the chair on the opposite side, back to the glass.

Without missing a beat, Beckett takes a seat in the chair across from him. "Now, Mr. Atkins…"

She proceeds to lay out their grounds for "inviting" him in; runs theories past him; explains the series of similar crimes, robberies, break-ins, murders, and kidnappings; and shows part of their evidence against him, all the time prodding subtly at him, with a combination of all the interrogation methods she's ever been taught. He responds to everything with a witty or condescending remark, a raised eyebrow, or amused silence.

After an hour, she's exhausted. After two, she starts to feel desperate. Castle watches as the polite smile never leaves her face, as her voice never falters, and as she never rises to Atkins' bait.

"Oh, Detective," he says finally, shaking his head, broad smile stretching across his face. She wishes she could beat it off of him, wishes she could shoot him and leave his bloody corpse in a public place, wishes to torture him slowly. "I think we both know that if you could arrest me," he leans forward, "you already would've."

"I don't about that," she replies casually, "you see, there is one more crime I have yet to bring up." Beckett flips open her folder and pulls out the picture from the very back. She's delayed this moment, hoping, praying, that something would happen before she got to it.

But it hasn't worked that way.

"This woman was murdered about twelve years ago. Johanna Beckett," she says with a calmness born of sheer desperation, slapping the photo down upon the table.

Atkins watches her, unimpressed.

She leans forward, "You see, we have three, independent witnesses whose stories about their involvement in this murder have to do with you." She slows down the last part of her sentence, making each word drop as dead weight.

He glances down for half a second, then back up to Beckett, brown eyes meeting green. His eyebrows dance. "Sorry. I've never seen her. Now, really, if you aren't going to charge me, I believe I'll be leaving."

He pushes back his chair and stands up.

Beckett's anger has morphed into a numb sensation of dread and helplessness and rage. He's just been playing with her this whole time. And she can't do anything because they have nothing to tie him to the crimes, nothing that would stand up in court, at least.

Actually, she could probably get him for one of the break-ins. But that wouldn't necessarily merit any jail time whatsoever. So it was pointless.

"You're going to tell me that you have never met this woman?" she asks, her voice raw with suppressed emotion.

Atkins blinks, the first unplanned reaction she's got out of him this entire time. Then his grin grows even wider. "I _thought_ you looked familiar," he says delightedly.

She stops breathing.

"The little Beckett girl, right? All growed up now. You were so young," he's relishing in her pain, and at this point it's just too much.

"Tell me" she replies, glaring at him, dropping the façade," you don't remember her."

He eyes her exultantly, searching for the perfect thing to say, "She was so _tasty_."

A decade and more of grief and pain washes over Beckett in a single moment. Her father's alcoholism, the moment she got the call about the body, the hopeless hours spent in vain at her mother's murder board, the years spent alone, the silent holidays, and the agonizing moments of heartache all combine into one, crushing load.

And he's _laughing_ at her.

The movement is instinctive. She's not sure how she gets out of her seat so fast but suddenly she's just inches from him. The next moment she's throwing him backwards, into the one-way mirror, shattering glass, slamming his head back with a strength she never knew she had.


	2. Chapter 2

_A/N: Thanks so much to everyone who reviewed! I'm glad that you all are comiserating with me about the two week break between episodes. We're three days closer now._

_I hope to get the third (and I'm fairly certain it will be the final) chapter up by Sunday, but we'll have to see what happens. I'd prefer to post it before 3:13 airs. Personally, I don't think the episode will play out like this story. I think I heard something about a stakeout, so maybe it's a cover-up kiss. But I'm going to be irritated if they do that. It's sooo unoriginal and just plain mean to us!_

_Thanks for reading._

* * *

Glass shatters, dropping to the ground in jagged pieces the size of her fist and in a shimmering cloud of tiny splinters. As quickly as sudden energy has just filled her veins, it deserts her. She drops her arms half a second after Atkin's head makes contact with the mirror.

He's stunned. She has managed to wipe the smirk from his lips and eyes, but the victory is bitter-sweet.

"You think this is just about me?" he spits, angrily. He peels himself off the wall, and in those few seconds, regains his composure, smiling a sadistic smile. "Well it's not. This is so much bigger than you could possibly understand. You haven't won, detective." He thrusts his hands out in from of him and gives her a little shove backwards to make his point.

Suddenly Castle is there, finally unfrozen, trying to pull her far away from him. And then the others, Ryan, Esposito, and a uniform she doesn't recognize, grabbing Atkins and rushing him from the room. She doesn't fight them, doesn't struggle as self-control reasserts itself. Vaguely aware of the shouting going on around her and the broken shards of glass that litter the floor, she walks past the mass of bodies and out of the room. She sits down at her desk and stares forward, numbly with her head propped up by her hands.

Montgomery is furious. She can hear him from here.

"I specifically _call_ the two of you out of the room and instruct you to make sure no one gets hurt, and you let Beckett _throw_ the man into the _wall_?"

"She moved so fast!" Esposito sounds stunned, still shocked by Beckett's complete loss of control, "We got in there as fast as we could." There's a lengthy pause. "Sorry," he adds, a bit grudgingly.

Montgomery sighs, rubbing his temples. "It's… it's really not your faults. It's mine. I shouldn't have let her in there. We have a whole precinct full of detectives here."

"But do you think," asks Castle suddenly, "that anyone else could have gotten a confession out of him?"

"Honestly? No," Montgomery replies, hesitating, "There are half a dozen police departments and government officials who have tried to nail this guy before. He's just too good."

"Well then you had to let her try," Castle's on a roll now, almost like he's in one of his stories, narrating a character's innermost thoughts, "Think about it. If you hadn't and someone else had failed, she never could have forgiven them."

"Castle…" Montgomery says warningly, but he presses on.

"And she couldn't have forgiven herself, either, for backing down. She always would have wondered and tortured herself over a different outcome."

"Castle!" Montgomery breaks in, "There _is_ no excuse. She threw him into the _wall_! I never should have allowed that."

"Sir?"

"Just… enough, Castle. Let it lie."

He turns to walk away, but Castle can't drop the subject. "Could you have done anything differently if you were in her place?" he prods, one last time.

The Captain's shoulders slump. There's a lengthy pause. "No," he says truthfully, "I would have done the same thing, perhaps even earlier. But I'm not in her place. I'm her _boss._ And so I have to criticize her actions. We're in enough trouble as it is, anyway." He pauses, turns, and stares at Beckett's motionless figure slumped over her desk. "Castle. I need to send her home. Make sure she gets there."

Walking over to her, he taps her on the shoulder. She flinches, then sees him and stands up.

"Go home," he says quietly.

"Sir?" she says flatly, with a tone that's somewhere between a statement and a question, but without enough inflection and energy to truly qualify as either.

"Just go home. Get some sleep," he walks off.

She stares after his retreating figure, then bends down and slowly puts her manila folder in her desk, collects her coat and keys and walks to the elevator. It's only after she reaches her car that she realizes that Castle has followed her.

"Go—" her voice catches and she has to clear her throat before continuing. "Go home, Castle," she says, echoing the Captain's words. "Go home, write a story in which Nikki ends up happy, in which the murderers are convicted and children keep their parents." There is no trace of sarcasm in her voice, nor bitterness, nor blame. It's what she needs in these books of his, what she relies on.

She unlocks her car, but he's still standing there. "Castle! Just listen to me for once!" she begging him, she realizes. About to burst into tears, she just wants to be alone before she loses control of her emotions for the second time in fifteen minutes. "Go home. Say hi to your mother. Hug your daughter. You don't know how much longer any of you have."

He doesn't say a word, doesn't move. She opens her car door and goes to slip inside, but Castle grabs her arm, twirling her back towards him and pulling her into a tight embrace.

Beckett resists for a moment, stiffens, but he doesn't let her go. Then she gives up, wrapping her arms around him and burying her face in his shoulder.

At six in the evening, the parking garage is quiet, and the light outside is quickly fading. It's finally a moment of peace.

When he lets her go, she holds onto him for a split second longer before stepping back. His shirt is slightly damp where a few tears have made their way from her eyes onto his shoulder.

She looks up from his shirt and suddenly realizes just how close they are. His face is inches from hers and his eyes are staring directly into her own, dark brown to green. She stops breathing, frozen in place. From the utter lack of sound around her, she realizes he isn't breathing either.

For a brief, irrational second, she thinks he's going to kiss her.

He shuts his eyes, briefly, no more than a blink, but it's enough. "Are you okay to drive home?" he asks, breaking the spell.

She blinks too, in a split second of confusion before she can catch herself.

Her nod is automatic, instinctive. After her thoughts unscramble themselves, she keeps nodding. He's never driven her car before and he never will.

"I'm fine," she says a little too quickly. Casting about for something else to say, she manages the ghost of a smile, "You'd probably run us into a tree."

It's a lame joke but the most she can handle right now.

"Nah, this is New York City. Probably just a telephone booth," he responds, smiling gently.

It's his smile that undoes her. Her breath catches. Suddenly she finds herself in his arms again and she's crying so hard that she's shaking. At first he's surprised, but then he holds her close to him, resting his head atop her own.

She's furious that he has stuck around to see her cry, yet infinitely grateful that he's still here. When she pulls back a few minutes later, unshed tears still fill her eyes and she can't even see straight. Wordlessly, she retrieves her keys from her coat pocket and pushes them into his hands, opening the passenger door and sitting down inside.

The drive to her apartment building is silent. She forces herself to stop crying, but there is a lump in her throat that makes it physically painful to swallow. Her hair hangs down like a curtain around her face as she stares at her feet.

After they've reached the parking garage just outside her apartment building and he has parked, neither one of them moves. She can't seem to make herself move, and he's unwilling to simply walk away.

"Do… you want to talk about it?"

Beckett considers it. She wants to scream and rage and just yell at someone to _fix _things! But does she want to talk about it? Talking about it seems so trite, like something one might do after a bad break-up or hard day at work. But she finds, somehow, that she does want to talk.

"I don't know how much more of this I can take," she says finally, bringing her head up and leaning against the window. Her face, reflected in the left side mirror doesn't show much of the crying fit that she's just indulged in, but her hair, where she's just run her hands through it to try to get it out of her face, is a tousled mess.

"I'm right where I was seven years ago, completely overwhelmed," her voice, quiet at first, is building, "I can't eat. I haven't been sleeping. I get into the precinct before seven in the morning and leave after eight at night because I can't handle all the time alone in my apartment." By this time she's rambling as fast as she can, as if she can't hold her words back anymore. "I see my mother when I close my eyes."

She doesn't sound like the Beckett that Castle's known for three years now. She won't make eye contact with him, and her hands are bunched into tight fists.

"I…" she hesitates, then ploughs forward with reckless speed, "considered killing him today. I did. I had all the information from the tail I set on him weeks ago. I could just let him leave and… follow him to a quiet place. It… would be so… simple."

She looks at him now, and he's not sure what expression she hopes to see on his face, so he settles for a sympathetic expression that he hopes isn't too pitying. She tears her eyes away and looks back out the window, staring at the shadows and flat planes of the garage.

"I decided not to. I—I couldn't do something like that, I think. But maybe I could. And then he wouldn't be able to kill some other innocent person... But I'm no vigilante," she whispers and turns to look at him again, her face showing the extent of her desperation, exhaustion, and worry. "And then I go home, and he is _all_ I think about until I fall asleep. And then again, when I wake up. It's taking over everything… This can't end well." She laughs, shakily. "Listen to me. I sound crazy." She pauses, "I gotta go."

She pulls the keys from the ignition and flings open her door, striding out into the dimly-lit garage.

Castle opens his door as well, forgetting even to close it in his haste. "Wait!" he calls.

She takes a few more steps and stops, hesitating. She turns around and he's then he's right there behind her, grabbing onto her upper arm.

"I won't let you."

Beckett stares at him. He hastily struggles to come up with the words he wants to say.

"I—we, we won't let you. We won't. We… we'll make sure you're okay."

She's trying to turn away now, shrugging her shoulder to make him let go, but he won't. Nothing is sounding the way he wants it to, but he keeps trying.

"Look, there are too many people who care too much about you to let anything bad happen. You'll get through this. You've got Lanie, Ryan, Esposito, your father… me. Josh. Call him." Castle says suddenly as he sets his jaw, pushing away his jealously, "Call him. Don't be alone tonight. Just for a few hours, at least."

She shakes her head.

"Kate…" he tries, risking the use of her first name again in an attempt to reach her.

She shakes her head more insistently, trying again to pull away. All she wants to do is get into her apartment, drop on her bed, and either sleep or cry. Whichever comes easiest.

"'The night is darkest before the dawn.' Lame saying, I know, but it's true. We'll distract you when you need it. We'll shut up when you don't. We _will_ catch Atkins and anyone else involved. Ah heck, some of us would probably kill him for you if you asked. I would, maybe."

She stares at him.

"Okay, now _I_ sound crazy," he admits, "The point is it will work out. And if it doesn't, we'll keep trying. But you won't lose yourself, because we'll pull you back," he's aware that what he's saying is starting to sound like the parts of Hell Hath No Fury that usually make him wince when he recalls them.

She's still staring at him, almost glassy-eyed. He can read the exhaustion in her face that is responsible for the day's break downs.

He doesn't know what possesses him in the next moment, but he leans forward and presses a gentle kiss on her lips.

The glassy expression vanishes in an instant. It's replaced by absolute astonishment.

He stares back, just as surprised as she is. His hands are still on her shoulders but he isn't holding her in place anymore and she isn't turning to leave. He frantically searches for an excuse, but knows that if he wanted to dismiss the kiss as platonic he should have said something several seconds ago. Or he shouldn't have kissed her in the first place.

Either would have worked.

But he has just stepped over the line. Their unspoken line. The line that both of them knew was there but would never have admitted to knowing.

The quiet darkness of the garage isn't comforting anymore. The silence is thick and building, crushing, tense. It's a holding pattern, just waiting.

She could ignore it. Just smile, say good night, and walk away. Pretend that it never happened and they both can go back to whatever they had before. It is probably better that way.

But, just maybe, what they had before wasn't so great either. He, dating an ex-wife whom he never truly loved as he should, and she, subconsciously sabotaging her relationships with wonderful men because her heart just can't get over the writer who took over her life the moment she met him.

Screw it.

The last thought propels her forward as time slows down. The next thing she knows, she's kissing him hard, wrapping her arms around his neck. He tightens his hold around her and pulls her in closer to him. There's no thought, no fear, no more remembering the past or worrying about the future. It's only the two of them in a moment outside of time.

When she pulls back, it could be minutes later or the next morning. There's no way of telling. His arms are still wrapped around her as she looks up at him, as if daring him to take it all back.

But he can't. They're too far beyond that point by now. She stands up on her toes and kisses him softly once more before gently disengaging herself and walking out of the garage to her apartment.

* * *

_I'm not certain how much I've kept Beckett in character here. I'm looking to push her to the breaking point enough to where she'll admit how stressed she is, but I'm wondering if I may have overdone it. I'd love to hear some of your opinions on this._


	3. Chapter 3

_Technically, I'm posting this on Sunday, b__ut it's really late where I live, so I'm not sure it counts. It's not the final chapter. I tried but just couldn't manage that without rushing things like crazy. This chapter is also a bit more introspective, and I want to finish with some action. So time-permitting, I will post the final chapter tomorrow. _

_Thanks again to everyone who's reviewed. I really appreciate the feedback._

_

* * *

_

Kissing Castle isn't a magic cure-all. Beckett still doesn't sleep well that night.

At two in the morning, she's still awake, vowing to try sleeping pills or at least Nyquil the next night. She's never been into misusing medication, even if it's only Nyquil, but she figures there's a limit to how messed up a person can get and that more than three hours of sleep each night might start the un-messing-up process.

Or something like that. It's a little difficult to focus on anything at two in the morning.

With a sign, she rolls over onto her side, eyes wide open, staring into the utter blackness around her. Then rolls back onto her other side, then onto her back, then curls up, then straightens out.

Ugh.

She closes her eyes, determined to fool her body into thinking it's asleep. However, her mind is too awake, darting about and remembering.

His smirk. Even now the memory of it is enough to make white-hot rage flood her system. The mirror, shattering. A million pieces cracking and floating to the ground, a hundred dancing shards of ice reflecting the fluorescent bulbs above. How easy it had been to lift him up, to throw him back into the glass. A victory, of sorts.

But a minor one. He could get away with murder, and she might face police brutality. At the very least, an official reprimand. At the most… Well, most cops didn't lose their job the first time. Usually, they got a warning the first time they went beyond propriety. Usually.

Why didn't he attack her in return? She returns to the thought that has plagued her for hours. He had simply stood up, had given her a little shove to make his point. With his size and skill, he could have beaten her to a bloody pulp by the time that the others had arrived in there.

And why did he give himself up? Hinting that he knew her mother and had lied when she asked him about it the first time gave them reasonable cause to hold him and get a warrant. He'd toyed with her, only to give in at the very end.

Why?

Was it only to take sadistic pleasure in her grief? Overwhelming arrogance and pride that led him to confess? Or, did she, somehow, earn a little bit of respect from Atkins by attacking him? Most people, herself included, would see the whole spectacle as a miserable lapse in judgment. But maybe, just maybe, it transformed her from a plaything to an actual human being.

She shakes her head abruptly, as if to shake the thoughts from her mind. It was probably the arrogance and pride and sadistic pleasure theory. She'll never really know.

Enough. She needs to think of something else now, anything, but nothing can keep her attention long enough to distract her from the memory of his exultant, sneering face.

She feels kind of bad for Castle, though. He must have been shocked when she'd stood up and thrown a man that size into the wall.

Castle.

With a start, she remembers the scene in the garage. Dwarfed at the moment by the other events of the day, she'd pushed it into the back of her mind. His arms around her, at first comforting, later pulling her in closer to him. And that kiss… like nothing else she'd ever felt.

Josh.

The realization is a metaphoric blast of cold water, a door slammed in the face. She hadn't thought about him, not once. She remembers Castle asking her to call Josh, him swallowing harshly as his eyes implored her to do as he asked. However, as a trained detective, his actions spoke louder than words to her. He absolutely can't stand Josh, which she well knows.

She knows just how acute the displeasure is, because she feels—felt—it with Gina. Now that Gina isn't dating Castle, she can feel indifferent towards the woman, maybe even feel a little sorry for her.

But not too sorry. Because Gina, for however brief a time, had Castle to herself. She'd had the courage to love him.

Beckett isn't stupid. She's many things: impatient, a rule-follower, someone who becomes stressed easily, stubborn, and a little too sarcastic at times, but she is certainly no fool. She doesn't need Esposito to tell her that Castle has a thing for her. Or Lanie, for that matter. She doesn't need anyone to tell her that she just might be happier with Castle than with anyone else.

But she had tried, once before, to admit to it. He had left for the Hamptons, dangling from Gina's arm like an overpriced hand bag. She can't go down that road again.

Josh is a good man. A surgeon, a biker, handsome, clever, funny, caring and protective. She needs to quit this thing with Castle before they've even started it.

All that she can think about, however, is her abrupt refusal to call Josh after she read the look in Castle's eyes. The self-sacrificing expression that he unsuccessfully attempted to mask. The look that begged her not to call him, even as his lips said something different.

The same lips that she'd flung herself towards a few seconds later.

Is it still called cheating if you don't realize that you're cheating until afterward?

Probably.

She could brush it off as her exhaustion, stress, and frustration. She could back out before she gets in too deep. The thought is annoyingly tempting. It wouldn't be right, of course, messing him around like that, but Castle's just a friend right now; a relationship would mean double or nothing. She's the type of person who bets conservatively. She doesn't risk it all. She can't risk it all…

Beckett slips into an uneasy sleep as the worries of the day twist and spin into dreams.

The next morning when she wakes up, things are clearer. Castle is still a big risk, and she's undecided about that. Josh, however, is an easier matter. She has a choice: either she can tell Josh what happened and ask him to forgive her, or she can break up with him.

There's no middle ground.

It takes only a second for her to decide. There's no way she can bring herself to explain the truth, because she doesn't know it herself. She can't make herself explain things to him, and doesn't even want to try.

She's no expert on relationships, but she figures that probably isn't a good sign.

She quietly dials Josh's telephone number.

* * *

Beckett stares at the murder board. Just stares at it, as if a clue, hidden for years, will come to the surface, as if she can physically will a shred of hope to appear. But there's nothing, just as before.

Suddenly, she feels his presence behind her. His silence is as loud as most people's shout. Personality, charisma... Whatever it is, it's impossible for her to ignore. He's very early this morning, and she almost wishes that he hadn't yet come. She hasn't figured out to act around him.

He makes it easy.

"Here," he says softly, placing the coffee beside her left hand which is splayed upon the table she's leaning against. Then he takes a step back, putting a comfortable distance between them. "Anything?"

She shakes her head, "No," she says, her voice cracking slightly.

He sighs and joins her in staring desperately at the board.

She barely speaks that day. Doesn't protest when Castle makes her take a break for lunch. Doesn't argue when he suggests she visit Lanie to see if she's found anything new or just to talk. She looks from the murder board to her computer and back, an endless tennis match with no victor.

She blinks when she hears that Atkins has been released, that a team of CSIs working through the night and morning had found nothing whatsoever to tie him to any crime, but shows no other emotion.

She's drained, mentally and physically. There's nothing more she can say or do. It's all she can handle to stick around until the end of the day. She's mechanical, an automaton completing Kate Beckett's tasks for her.

By five o'clock she feels like she's about to lose it again. Quickly excusing herself, she bids everyone good night and heads toward the elevator. Castle hesitates, follows.

It's the first time they've been completely alone since last night.

It's awkward as heck.

She had thought she was beyond emotion until now, as she tries to ignore the tension in the air. As the doors close, she sneaks a glance at him from the corner of her eye. He's staring forward.

"You alright?" he asks finally, not taking his eyes off the doors in front of him.

No. Of course not. "Yes," she says, not looking at him either.

It's a silly question and a silly answer. They've been playing the friendly concern game for so long now that it has become habit. Yesterday's honesty is fading fast.

"We'll get him," Castle says softly.

The elevator opens into the main lobby, and she turns to face him. People are moving in a dozen different directions in the room before them, but all he sees is her. The faintest trace of unshed tears shimmer in her eyes and lashes.

"No," she whispers, her closed, guarded expression fading and showing the emotion that she's been hiding all day. She closes her eyes briefly, "I don't think we will."


	4. Chapter 4

_A/N: Well, this story has served its purpose. I've survived a frantically busy week, and episode 3:13 airs shortly. _

_Thanks again to everyone who has reviewed; I sincerely appreciate all of them._

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She swallows harshly, then opens her eyes and turns to leave. She walks out of the elevator, then pauses, hesitant. This whole walking-away-from-Castle thing is starting to get repetitious.

Biting her lip, she half turns and looks at him over her shoulder, says the first thing that comes to her mind. "You know, you haven't said or done even one annoying, childish, funny, rude, sarcastic, clever, or otherwise Castle-esque thing today."

"I know," he says. He smiles then, a mischievous glint in his eyes, "I thought up some really good ones, though, if you'd ever like to hear them."

"Why?" she asks, ignoring the second comment but relieved to hear the normality of it. She won't let him distract her with his cavalier attitude, however.

The smile vanishes, "Because…" he hesitates, "because I didn't want to say the wrong thing. I didn't want to… upset you today, with everything else."

Her shoulders slump, and she realizes only then how much stress she was carrying in them. She suddenly feels compelled to reassure him. "I... I would have forgiven you, Castle. I always have before," she offers a tiny smile.

"I know," he says.

She raises an eyebrow.

He hastily amends his statement, "I meant you always have forgiven me before. Not that you always will." He smiles now, "I fully expect you to shoot me someday."

Her smile grows, and he's thrilled to see an expression on her face besides numbness and exhaustion.

"But until you kill me," he continues, warmth in both his voice and eyes, "I'll be here with you."

She actually flinches.

It's like one of those slow-motion moments in a movie, in which a character learns something that changes everything and can only stand there in shock. Had she been drinking or eating something, she probably would have choked.

His expression changes to concern as she stares at him. "You okay?" he asks, taking a step forward and unconsciously extending his hand slightly as if to catch her, as if she were about to faint.

She clears her throat, "Yeah," she says quickly.

But still, she stares at him, letting a new realization flood her mind.

Castle is a good man.

Yes, to some extent she'd already known that. She'd seen the way he'd cared for his daughter, allowed his mother to live with them, helped her and others, and was determined to catch their suspects and bring justice to victims.

But she'd worried too much about the other facets of his life: his two exes, the numerous affairs, his obvious admiration of shallow and plastic-surgery addicted women, his impetuousness, and his obstinacy. Whenever she had allowed herself to think about him as more than a friend, she'd shrugged him off as not stable enough, a flighty individual, especially after he left for the Hamptons with Gina.

But she hadn't seen the bigger picture.

He is a good person. He has his faults, but she isn't exactly the poster child for propriety. She stares at him, and realizes that they just might work out.

Someday.

Not today, because emotions are running strong and they're exhausted and worried. Her mother's case still takes the majority of her thoughts, but it is slowly becoming manageable.

For the first time, she thinks about what her mother would have had to say about her daughter's obsession with her murder. She wonders, fleetingly, if her obsessive preoccupation would annoy her mother, a woman who always advocated love, forgiveness, and hope. Love that Beckett had hidden from due to fear, forgiveness that she had done away with the moment she'd seen her mother's body, and hope that she'd long forgotten.

But here was hope.

These thoughts flash through her mind in a moment. He's still eying her warily. "You sure?"

She nods, not trusting her voice. Her world has just spun, minutely perhaps, but instantaneously. It's such a small but obvious shift that she can't believe it feels like such a revelation.

He takes a deep breath and steps back when it becomes obvious that she's okay, shoving his hands in his pockets and looking down at the ground. "Look, about yesterday," he looks up but doesn't meet her eyes. "I'm sorry."

Her heart stops for a second. She knows he can't really deny what happened between them, but she's afraid he might try. "Don't worry about it," she says quickly, cutting him off, "No problem."

"No," he finally meets her eyes, "I mean it. I know you're with Josh and last night was really stressful and all and I'm sorry that…" he trails off and shrugs, unsure of how to complete the sentence, "I—I just, I hope it works out between you and that you're happy," he finishes with a half-truth. He really hopes that she's happy, but there's also a nagging little voice in the back of his mind that suggests that it would be a wonderful compromise if she were to be happy without Josh.

"I broke up with him," she says, almost cavalier about the whole thing, "This morning, actually."

He's stunned and regretful, but a little too pleased, "I'm sorry," he says, with at least some sincerity.

"It's not your fault," she shrugs, "We weren't getting along too well anyway."

"But I thought he was Dr. Perfect."

He regrets the words the moment they leave his mouth, but she just looks mildly amused. She wonders why he even bothers to attempt to hide his true thoughts from her. "Perfect people get annoying after a while."

"Really? Can't say I know the feeling," he smiles, relieved. Then his expression sobers, "I am sorry, though. I shouldn't have…" he trails off again, unable to say the words "kissed you."

"You never liked Josh," she says, dodging his apology.

"You did. And I should have respected that."

She finds that the more she tries to brush off his apologies, the more self-degrading he becomes. This only reaffirms what she realized moments ago. For all his posturing and bravado, his ego really isn't all that big. He cares what she thinks about him.

"It's okay," she says, leaning one hand on the still open door of the elevator. There are probably people upstairs furiously waiting to use the elevator, but she doesn't leave. "I never used to like Gina," she admits.

"Used to?" asks Castle after a moment, suddenly entertaining a ridiculous thought in his mind.

"Before," she says. Her voice is casual, but her eyes are direct, almost challenging. "Now she's fine."

It's his turn to stare. "Since when?" he dares to ask, the ridiculous thought gaining strength.

She shrugs, realizing she's enjoying herself. "Week or two."

He realizes he's holding his breath. "And why is that?"

A smile flickers on her face and she reaches up and starts playing with a strand of her hair, twisting it through her fingers. "You're gonna make me say it?"

Their voices are so casual that they could be talking about the weather.

"I don't think I'll believe it unless you do," he replies.

"Really? I thought writers were supposed to be intuitive," she's taunting him now.

His ridiculous thought suddenly isn't so crazy. She disliked Gina for the same reason he couldn't stand Josh. Now, neither of the two is a problem. For once, Castle and Beckett will admit to being on the same page.

Her phone beeps suddenly, a text message. She glances at it, then back up at him. "My dad," she explains, "I'm taking tomorrow off, starting the weekend early. We're going to visit some of my mom's family." She slips the phone into her pocket and turns to go. "See you Monday."

He steps forward quickly, catches her hand, stopping her. "Take care," he says quietly, "of both of you."

Her only response is a slow smile. She squeezes his hand briefly but tightly and then releases it, walking backward a few steps and watching him for a few more seconds before she turns around and leaves.

Her mother would have loved him. She can feel tears threatening at the corners of her eyes again as she walks away, but the grief is almost bittersweet. A small, hesitant smile forms on her face as she slips out the front doors.

Someday with Castle might come sooner than she'd first thought.


End file.
